time? ♪ or help doctors turn billions of bytes of shared information... ♪ into a fifth anniversary of remission? ♪ whatever your business challenge, dell has the technology and services to help you solve it. final trade. tim seymour? >> ttm, take some profits. >> dan? >> vix. >> b.k.? >> jjg, buy it. >> doc j? >> deck. unusual activity following up on yesterday's takeover rumors. >> thank you so much, i'm melissa lee. meantime, don't go anywhere because "mad money" with jim cramer starts right now.

i'm jim cramer. and welcome to my world. >> you need to get in the game. go out of business and he's nuts! they're nuts! they know nothing! i always like to say there's a bull market somewhere. "mad money," you can't afford to miss it. other people want to make friends, hey, i'm just trying to help you save a little money. my job is not just to entertain, but i'm trying to coach and teach you. so call me at 1-800-743-cnbc. just when you think the stock market can't keep rallying, when you think that stocks have gone up too far, too fast, the buyers, they come in with a vengeance today! ♪ hallelujah . dow climbed 82 points, closed the at a five year high.

why did the stocks rally? why? sometimes it is pretty call cuable, simple, because the simplest driver on earth, china, reported a blowout export number showing the country's plans to reignite growth are, indeed, working and we believe in that. when that happens, buyers swarm in, they buy commodities, thinking how could they not rule now that china's spending. they buy the industrials because china relies on a lot of our companies to power their electricity and buy our consumer companies that have plunged deep into the retail fabric. that's why investing in china is one of my huge themes for 2013. oh, it's not just china, the market clobbered versus the euro something that our international companies they just love to see. it puts them here. >> house of pleasure. >> why else? how about the fact that ford, one of the best bell weathers of economic growth out there

doubled its dividend last night. something i said was a possibility earlier this week when we recommended it as a way to play the auto super cycle i see playing out. yes, these are clear cases where our themes are the place to circle the wagons during the confusion of 2013. we can fret over the new treasury secretary. we can marvel about the battle royale over hedge fund managers. please stay away from that firing range. and we can ponder the oncoming train -- >> all aboard -- >> that is the debt ceiling debacle. or we can fall back on these themes i keep talking about. themes that give us a place to go within all the skirmishing that defines our marketplace day after day. we've gone over china, the banks, and housing. we've told you that the autos and insurance stocks should be bought on weakness and aerospace can work. stay focused when your favorite companies in these sectors. and tonight i've got two new

ones, two themes that aren't going away. if anything, i think they're accelerating in 2013. the first, when you speak of big themes, you cannot ignore the revolution in energy in this country. >> buy, buy, buy! >> we have so much of it, particularly so much natural gas it will not be just 2013, 2012, but a multi-year game changer. while we're thrilled about north american energy independence, and by the way, the american technology behind them, don't forget that, we need to ask, how can this theme make us money? i mean, this is "mad money," not mad energy sufficiency. who are the principal winners from years of ultra cheap natural gas to come? the answer, the chemical companies. the plastic makers. because they're the big beneficiaries of the remarkably low cost of natural gas related feed stock, what goes into plastic. and the best of the best, dow chemical, ppg, westlake, georgia

gulf and liondel basin. they thrive on the cost advantage of two of my absolute favorite gals when it comes to making plastic poly and ethel. at this moment, only dow chemicals has done much to capitalize on the cheap domestic energy. taking advantage of the cheap natural gas plays in the good old usa. it's almost as if the bulk of the chemical companies don't believe natural gas is going to stay as low as it is. but i believe that 2013 will be the year when chemical companies take advantage of the inexpensive feed stock. dow's a big chemical company, we've profiled ppg so many times. you know i think the world of them. if you invest in something that captures this theme and that predominant theme of the housing

rebound, i want you to consider georgia gulf that has been high today. i've not been a fan of it, but listen to this story for a second. i think this one could have a much further to go. never heard of georgia gulf, i helped bring it public in the '80s. makes pvc. which is used in everything from piping to window frames to faux wood like i used in the columns and railings outside of my house because i was so sick of the real wood rotting. normally i don't like the commodity chemical players, i prefer ppg because they offer chemical compounds that are unique, can't be copied. admittedly, georgia gulf's the opposite. this is a true sink or swim chemical company that explodes higher when the end markets are good and it can raise prices and does get crushed when the end markets are bad. in fact, georgia gulf did something rather amazing. and this was the company that was very troubled during the downtown. it doubled down commodity chemicals by buying ppg's commodity business.

i'm reiterating that now. i don't expect georgia gulf to stay a premium stock forever, okay? but for 2013, it could be, indeed, the best in the group. ggc. and i've recommended that on the show because of the turmoil over the years, but it's right for this cycle. who else benefits from the natural gas renaissance? they can arbitrage cheap oil in this company and expensive oil overseas by refining crude and selling it to you at the pump for prices that are wildly high because they're dictated by the imported oil not our price. and the domestic price, if our nation had an energy policy, we could figure out a way to have the consumer do better, but event done that. one last winner, lng, cheniere energy. the master limited partnership,

he's the pioneer who is building our nation's biggest export terminal for liquefied natural gas down in louisiana. look out, these two stocks are hot, too hot for me, wait for a pullback from lng or maybe a stock offering from cheniere energy partners. my eighth theme, let me give you a preamble, technology represents more than 15% of the imports. it's almost impossible to avoids a place holder in the portfolio. it's got to be a theme. there are very few investment themes in tech. but individual companies might suffice. oracle, a terrific stock, competitive. i think the world of s.a.p., oracle's biggest competitor. it's had a good quarter. although an endless dog fight with oracle. then there's salesforce.com, an expensive but dominant cloud computing play. run by cloud pioneer, i like apple, i'm not pounding the table, i just told you to invest in it. social media, on a pullback,

liked it lower. who really knows how it's doing. sure, i like them, but they don't have thematic ideas. that's what this show is about. themes. so much of tech is caught up in the pc world it's treacherous out there. the only area i feel truly comfortable with in long-term for all of 2013 which is the -- investors horizon in 2013 is a long year is the next generation buildout for cell phones. you've got a rising tide lifting all boats. even this morning with the announcement of better than expected earnings from nokia. 2013 will be the year of 4g and only year of the 5g buildout. even here there are few plays to play beyond the continual theme of the tower stocks. the carriers need more of them. they've been bragging about how many they have, including s.a.p. communications and american tower. i standed by qualcomm and broad come. chip stocks deep in the heart of the next generation phones, the

latter of which is in my charitable trust. and other stocks on actionalertplus.com. jds and for the screening of video over the internet. so here's the bottom line, the revolution in oil and gas is being televised right here on "mad money." with my suggestion to buy the chemical companies, the real beneficiaries of our low energy prices in this country. and if you want tech, you've got to stick with the cell phone technology as the 4g and 5g are coming on strong and cannot be stopped by anyone, even by an act of congress. now, that's saying something. i want to start with brian in new york. brian? >> caller: hey, jim, this is brian from staten island. and my question is in regards to the future of sirius radio. i was curious how you think the liberty media takeover will impact the stock. and do you believe the company has what it takes to reach its projected revenue of $3.7 b

billion for 2013? >> yes, i do. earlier i talked about how maybe sirius didn't treat mel that well. mel took it higher, but mel made a lot of money and greg buffett is running sirius, he's overseeing it because he works at liberty. he's a good guy and so is mel and i think sirius can go higher. it's been another great speculative win. two more big themes for 2013. these come as big as our domestic energy evolution and the tech in your pocket. stick around, i've got more winners coming up. "mad money's" coming up. coming up -- playing for profit. cramer's top stock playoff continues. the dow champion has already been crowned. and tonight, cramer's putting the s&p's best to the test. which stock will rise to the challenge of making you money in 2013? the answer is next. and later -- joy stuck? the rise of social and global

gaming has given another life to entertainment earnings. but it's not all fun and games. cramer's sounding the alarm on one stock that could threaten to hit the reset button on your games. find out if it's lurking in your portfolio. plus, digital diagnosis. athena health offers cloud-based solutions to make medical providers across the country more efficient and profitable. as america looks to cut back on the health costs, could athena rise to profits? cramer talks to the ceo just ahead. all coming up on "mad money." don't miss a second of "mad money," follow @jimcramer on twitter, have a question? tweet cramer #madtweets. send jim an e-mail to madmoney@cnbc.com. or give us a call at 1-800-743-cnbc.

miss something? head to madmoney.cnbc.com.

every january, like to take my cue from the nfl playoffs and pick the previous year's best

performers in the market against each other to see which ones are most likely to repeat that outperformance going forward. i think you can learn from the past winners. on monday, we started with 2012's two best performers on the dow jones industrial average, the equivalent of the nfc playoffs, bank of america versus home depot and i told you bank of america was the winner because i think the banks are poised to rally pretty heavily this year and bank of america has rapidly gone from worst to first. lots of people @jimcramer on twitter were moaning that i buried them in bank of america after that playoff game. because it dropped 37 cents. ladies and gentlemen, this is the super bowl for heaven sake. that's the first play from scrimmage. let the game play out, please, and anyway, it tacked on 35 cents today. okay, so nine yards back on the tenth. tonight we're going to do the afc playoffs. and no, i'm not talking about the upcoming patriots/texans game where i will root for the

pats because the owners about as great as it gets. i'm not talking about football, i'm talking about the contests between the two top performers in the s&p 500 last year and the winner will, indeed, go on to face off against bank of america home game in tomorrow's stock market super bowl. well, actually it's new orleans with beyonce. no, it's actually with me and engelwood cliffs with no halftime show whatsoever a lightning round. who made it to the playoffs? the best performers in the index last year were sprint, which you know we nailed up a magnificent 188%. i think both of these stocks can go higher in 2013. but if you want to know which one is most likely rack up major gains, i believe it will be pulte which is one of the largest home builders when housing is in the middle of a

huge multi-year expansion. you're probably asking, why m aso quick to write off sprint? after all, i was a huge supporter of sprint last year even back when hardly anyone believed in it. there's a logical question. is it because the ceo is from notre dame and the fighting irish were turned into pacifist conscientious as they were being tackled by the crimson tide? no. i do think the stock can go higher, but the easy money. a year ago sprint was speculation, you bought the stock and betting the company would be able to turn around its business, clean up the balance sheet, or best of all, a takeover bid. and if you made that bet, it paid off big time under hesse's leadership, they have pulled off a fabulous turn around. got the hands on apple's iphone. it improved the balance sheet. then in october, something incredible happened. the big japanese tech firm

announced it would invest $20 billion to get a 70% stake in sprint with the company paying $7.30 in cash upfront for 55% of sprint's outstanding shares. the soft bank deal was the catalyst we've been waiting for. thanks to this transaction, sprint will become a well-capitalized company that can truly compete against the likes of at&t and verizon. however, the soft bank deal also means a major part of the thesis has played out, man. come on, ca-ching ca-ching for somebody. sprint already caught a bid, it's not going to get another one. in other words, the reason for the stock's epic rally in 2012 are not going to repeat themselves in 2013. plus the story has some hair on it which is a lot more than i have, complications. in mid-december, sprint announced they intended to buy the rest of clearwire, the 4g provider they owned about half of for about $2 billion in order to get their hands on clearwire's spectrum. then on tuesday we learned that dish network made a bid. well, a soft offer.

sprint said they won't need to increase their bid, which is a hard offer, but you know, the situation's gotten a little messy. i still think sprint can only go higher because the underlying fundamentals here are improving. but in 2012, the stock nearly tripled and we're not going to see anything close to that again. oh, one more thing. because of the mechanics because of the soft bank transaction, please listen. i'm going to use a terrible word. this is complicated. you're going to see sprint's stock trade substantially lower when this deal closes, but you won't be losing any money. let me explain. because i think it's going to freak people out. here's how it works. remember, soft bank offered $7.30, this is algebra, people, $7.30 for 55% of sprint's outstanding shares. what does this mean if you're a sprint shareholder? all right. let's use this example. you bought 100 shares of sprint at $6, a little bit above where it's trading now, for $600, soft banking is going to give you 55 of those shares from you for 7.30 each, that works out to

$400 in cash, the total investment is going to be $600. soft bank has paid you 400 for 55% of your position, your remaining 45 shares are going to be worth $200 or $4.40 apiece. don't be alarmed when the deal closes and you see the decline happen. how about pulte, the second best performer in the s&p for 2012. that's a different story. one of the largest home builders in the nation when the market was stagnant. it was a hideous underperformer. but as the housing market came back in 2012, pulte came right back with it. and i think this move will continue as the housing recovery has begun. something that bank of america and merrill agreed after the close tonight. reports about the housing recommended toll, that was my favorite chip in the housing game the other day. i already talked about housing as one of my favorite themes for 2013. and beyond earlier this week, it could be the preeminent thesis for 2013. we've worked through the

oversupply inventory and mortgage rates are so low, housing prices have been rising steadily for the past months. and there's a huge backlog of people who want to stop living with their in-laws, been there, did that, so they can start a family. pulte is not the best home builder out there, in my opinion. again, i like tol, but pulte has something the market likes, it may show tremendous improvement in earnings. go back to 2009, pulte was a mess, bought a lower end home builder but massively overpaid because the housing market got crushed and they got stuck with a lot of bad land. since then, the company's been trying to get the house in order by cutting costs and cleaning up the balance sheet. and last year started to see the benefits from these moves as the margins began to increase. something that's going to continue in 2013, plus up against easy comparisons. remember, the themes are for market wide pullbacks, you've got to wait for one. that said, this is a name to

come back to in 2013 because the housing thesis is just that strong. and to be clear, again, pulte overpaid for centex. it was a darn good company and while there was some bad land, there was some fantastic land built terrific developments in growing portions of the country. here's the bottom line, in 2012, sprint and pulte homes were the top two performers in the s&p 500. in 2013, i think pulte will be the winner as the housing rebound is strong enough to propel the stock to much higher levels. now we have the winner for the s&p playoff. and tomorrow, pulte will face off against the dow jones champion bank of america and our "mad money" stock super bowl. and one more thing, you, my friends and followers are the 12th man in this contest, the 12th man. here's what you do, you go on to twitter @jimcramer, cramer, and

tell me who you think should be the winner. stick with cramer. coming up -- joy stuck? the rise of social and mobile gaming has given another life to entertainment earnings. but it's not all fun and games. cramer's sounding the alarm on one stock that could threaten to hit the reset button on your gains. find out if it's lurking in your portfolio. at 1:45, the aflac duck was brought in with multiple lacerations to the wing and a fractured beak. surgery was successful,

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excuse me. it's never too late to sell a stock where the fundamentals of the underlying company are in decline. gme, the largest video game retailer in the world with some 6,600 stores, 70% of which are in the u.s. now, you think that a company that makes the money selling video games would do well during the holidays, right? yet, on tuesday morning, game stop reported weak holiday numbers. comprising the holiday season down 4.6%, making matters worse, the company gave negative same-store sales guidance for the fiscal fourth quarter. same-store sales are the key metric and that fiscal fourth quarter ends on january 28th. they're looking for a 4% to 7% decline. that's the most important one of the year for gamestop.

when the company gets more than half of the annual profits and looks like it blew it. it's not the first time. this is the eighth consecutive quarter. meaning two straight years. where gamestop has issued a forecast that came in below wall street estimates. i mean, talk about a serial disappointor. this is the special k of disappointments. cut the earnings per share guidance for 2013. no world the stock dropped on tuesday. it's now down 8.6% since the announcement. yeah, pretty easy to figure. even though the stock has been hit, you know what? i actually don't think it's too late to sell. yep, for gamestop, it could be game over. they had a run-up in november and december, some people got suckered into anticipating a good holiday season. and now that rally's been repealed. that said, i think the problems run deeper than one bad quarter, even a few bad quarters and the stock has room to fall, people. here's the reason, in the last

couple of years the nature of the gaming business has changed dramatically in ways that are bad for gamestop. instead of buying video games in a store, we now have free online gaming like zynga, cheap mobile games like the ones you play on your iphone, i know i do, and the publishing industry has gotten behind digital distribution where you can download video games straight to your console. rather than having to take a trip down to the store, why spend $60 for a video game when at gamestop you can play dozens of terrific games online for free or pay next to nothing for angry birds? these changes are getting more dramatic by the day. i have so much time to play angry birds, in between when i'm switching avatars @jimcramer on twitter. and they make you wonder whether a big part of gamestop's business selling hard copies of new and used games, maybe it's becoming obsolete. in other words, i think gamestop

is a company what's called secular decline. meaning things are going to get worse over time. it's not going to be something that changes, the economy gets better and suddenly people start going to gamestop. some of the bulls and there are a lot of them here claim that gamestop's problems are what's known as cyclical in nature, meaning it's temporary, going to bounce back. they're talking about the video game console cycle. the idea is that the big gaming platforms like xbox 360, they've gotten old, tired, and when you reach the end of the cycle, people tend to buy fewer new video games. hope is when they release new consoles, like nintendo did with the wii u it will boost demand. look, that would be great. i don't know, and i do think these hopes are seriously misplaced. gamestop's woes are bigger than the need for a new product cycle. the real red flag that popped out at me -- from gamestop's numbers had to do with used

video games. and they actually tend to do better toward the end of the cycle. yet, during the holiday season, gamestop's used game sales, they declined. this was just horrendous. 15.6%. how bad is that? well, used games represent 38% of gamestop's revenues, more importantly, they carry higher margins than new games, make more money on each sale than new games and management's been touting the used video game business as the way forward for the company in this environment. they were supposed to be gamestop's salvation, instead down more than 15%. can you believe that? that seems like maybe management is -- they're not ready for this. maybe they don't have as good of a handle on things as they think. plus the new video game consoles that bulls are excited about do get released, they might include technology that makes it so only the original user could play that game. that would be something, right? beyond the ailing used game business, gamestop plans to grow the digital business, selling games over the internet, dramatically over the next couple of years.

but, i don't see how they compete against more established online players. fact is, gamestop has to compete with amazon on way too many fronts. they sell the same gaming hardware and software, does digital down loads too, letting you buy and download games online, amazon's on fire here and they do it really well. and amazon makes it easy to find and buy used video games by connecting you with vendors and individuals all over the world who want to sell. you don't want to be in competition with amazon, right? okay. think about what amazon did to best buy. this is a little better situation maybe, but it could be roughly similar. the bulls would like you to believe that gamestop can close stores, cut marketing cost and buy back stock in order to manufacture decent looking earnings per share result when the company reports, but if that happens, i don't want you to be suckered in. bulls say it's right for a takeover bid. goldman sachs likely takeover plays. sure, anything at a price, but

i -- i think the price is wrong. yield, i don't want you to be tempted by the 4.4% yield. but the stock is going lower. and those losses will more than offset the yield. gamestop right here reminds me a bit of best buy. a few years ago, okay, when it became clear the core business was being pillaged and they have no real great way to fend off the competition, that story hasn't ended well and i don't see gamestop ending well either. after the hideous numbers on tuesday, i've got to put gamestop in the sell block, i have to. this is looking more and more like a company in secular decline and not cyclical. and even the things management has called out as solutions, like the used video game business, they're becoming problems. with a stock like gamestop, it's not too late to sell. nate in california. nate? >> caller: jim, sending you a big california boo-yah. >> golden state boo-yah back at you. >> caller: you got it. this is a very important call.

i am getting married in a week, the wedding is not cheap, the honeymoon is not cheap, and that ring sure as heck was not cheap. so we need to make some money here. >> why the heck you doing it? >> caller: that's a good question. and apparently you can't help me with that, you can help me with stocks. that fair enough? >> yeah, that first one, i don't know if i'm the call. but go ahead. >> caller: let's talk best buy here. you know what the deal is with them, i'm left with two major questions. >> i'll let you have two. i usually only let you have one. you're facing that prolonged sentence, i'll let you down. two more. two on the green mile, all right, partner? >> caller: i'm only going to focus on these two questions, i get overwhelmed otherwise. >> okay. >> caller: already pushed back one time. a, is funding even going to come through? b, there's been a lot of chatter about management changes, what the heck is going to happen there? >> all right. >> caller: i thought maybe this stock is good to jump on -- >> well, i talked about this

with my friend buddy pal david faber today. if nokia can come back, if clearwire can come back, if sprint can come back, maybe i'm being too negative. and i said i don't want to sell hewlett-packard anymore, but best buy i think every time you get a takeover chatter, you should go because cash flow is what makes a deal get done. nate, i want to wish you best of luck. i wish you guys will have a long and happy life together, but i don't think best buy should be included. not if you want to have a real nice honeymoon. it's gameover for gamestop here. the company's facing too many obstacles and i think it could be headed lower. could be headed for a bounce, i don't know. i don't like it. don't move, "lightning round's" coming up. ♪

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it is time, it is time for the "lightning round" on cramer's "mad money." i tell you whether to buy or sell. play until this sound and then the "lightning round" is over. time for the "lightning round" on cramer's "mad money." aaron in washington. aaron? >> caller: hey there, i'm

looking at super value, selling off a lot of their banners to make more debt reductions. >> well, you know -- i think the game has changed. and i think the game is over. it was a great trade and now it's over. i want to go to chase in california. chase? >> caller: hey, from phoenix. i got a new energy stock when it took a huge pullback. it then started a very steep spiral down. >> right. >> caller: i hung on for the 19 cents monthly share dividend. >> yes. >> caller: waiting for the stock to go up. dividends went down to half, the stock's way down -- >> i don't want you to sell it. i don't want you to sell it, i think you hold on to that stock. let's go to jacob in indiana. jacob? jacob? >> caller: hello, jim cramer. >> yeah, chief, how are you doing? >> caller: doing great. here's my dad with my question. >> sure. hey, dad.

>> caller: jim, i guess j.d.'s too young to ask the question. i'm trying to get my son more interested in investing. >> okay. >> caller: than playing video games. so we have a question about take two interactive with grand theft auto 5 coming out. >> no, no, no -- sir, i've got to tell you, that's been a flat line. i know they're trying to do the best job, but you know what? that's just a challenge situation and i don't want you to be there. i would suggest look around, what is the -- what is the app that he likes. find out that kind of thing and get together with him and find something -- maybe you like panera, maybe you like to get a dominos pizza. march? >> caller: boo-yah, president cramer, this is marge from 83-degree braedenton, florida. >> i should have called you earlier. what's up? >> caller: oh, i love it. thank you so much. every night we watch you. i have learned and earned. >> learned and earned.

hey, you ought to wake up with cramer with that learned and earned. >> caller: love it. >> go ahead. >> caller: yahoo. >> yes, i like yahoo, i think this is the pause that refreshes. >> buy, buy, buy! >> one more. liz in maryland. liz? >> caller: yeah. >> liz? >> caller: yes. >> go ahead, you're up, liz. >> caller: all right. i'm liz from ocean city, maryland. i'd like to give a little shoutout to my economics teacher mr. marks. >> good man. >> caller: wwav -- >> no, if you want to do that, we're going to be in dean foods. by the way, i think it's overdone. and that, ladies and gentlemen, is the conclusion of the "lightning round." >> the "lightning round" is sponsored by td ameritrade. coming up -- digital diagnosis, athena health making medical providers more efficient and profitable.

as america looks to cut back on the health costs, could athena rise to prominence? or is this cloud play overinflated? cramer talks to the ceo just ahead. work. and his new boss told him two things -- cook what you love, and save your money. joe doesn't know it yet, but he'll work his way up from busser to waiter to chef before opening a restaurant specializing in fish and game from the great northwest. he'll start investing early, he'll find some good people to help guide him, and he'll set money aside from his first day of work to his last, which isn't rocket science. it's just common sense. from td ameritrade. it's just common sense. we asked total strangers to watch it for us. thank you so much. i appreciate it. i'll be right back. they didn't take a dime. how much in fees does your bank take to watch your money? if your bank takes more money than a stranger, you need an ally.

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what happens when you combine two game-changing ideas to one company. you have a stock like athena health, one that's run up 57% in the last 12 months. athena provides software platforms for electronic medical records and for helping doctors collect their bills from patients and insurance companies. they're trying to modernize the doctors office along the lines of a company like cerna, but athena has a twist, does all of them from the cloud. that's right. it's known as a software as a service company. the same business model as long time cramer fave salesforce.com. this allows them to have lower upfront costs and gets updates out much faster, buy a higher quality product for cheaper. it sells for 68 times next year's earnings.

a company that makes mobile apps for $293 million, could give a huge number of new clients and the market loved the news, stock's up 6.3% the next day. this is an intriguing, albeit expensive story. let's hear more about it from jonathan bush, the co-founder, chairman, and ceo of athena health who has built an amazing company. honored to have you on "mad money." >> jim, what an honor. i've been jumping up and down outside your studio for years trying to get in next next to all scripps, thank you for having me. >> we liked all scripps when it was going on and slapped the sell on at 18, athena didn't buy it, did you? >> not no, but hell no, jim. this internet thing's going to be big, and anybody still trapped in enterprise software is probably toast. >> and i think you -- you didn't know -- did you know it was the cloud when you started? i've been reading everything about you. it was the -- you did it before

it was called a cloud? >> absolutely. we didn't know what to call it. we used to give speeches saying i'll give a fruit basket to anyone who will tell us what we are. and it's really a cloud-based service. we think we're the next generation beyond the salesforce companies because we sell outcomes. so if salesforce.com was for sale, if you paid for it by the meeting or by the sale -- >> right. >> that would be like athena. our clients pay by the filed chart, by the paid meaningful use bonus from the government. and so we're at risk for the outcomes and we do a lot of the back-office work almost like an outsourcer in our cloud-based service centers. >> and you save the system how much money? >> oh, it's in the bush family we call it a brazillion dollars, it's a huge amount. we don't know, but we know doctors are collecting their payments about 35% faster, they're getting about 12% more and they're spending less money

on staff and technology to do it. >> my worry had been that you're going to have to -- in order to get from 4% to 8%, you were going to have to higher hundreds of thousands, high-priced salespeople. but you made an acquisition this week that could change that dramatically, didn't you? >> thank you for noticing. yeah, it is just off the charts in the health care space for awareness and favorability. if you run doctors through different brands, the most appealing one to doctors is ipocrates. if they're writing a prescription for a drug they don't normally do and don't feel confident, they double check it. and so it's a very respected, very trusted, highly curated data set available on the iphone. they were the first health care app in the apple store, and they are wonderful to work with. it's a great culture, it's a fiduciary orientation toward the doctor, and cloud-based.

we can change it as often as we need to. >> how many -- 330,000 u.s. users? >> 330,000 doctors, there's about 1 million users, but 330,000 doctors. 200 million drug look-ups, and this is my favorite part in terms of trust, 96% of doctors in this survey showed -- said they actually changed a prescription decision as a result of their little trusty ipoca ipocates. our mission statement is to be the most trusted service by helping them do well. it's right up the middle. in fact, kind of ahead of us given how widely recognized they are. >> all right. now, i know that you are passionate about making it so the health care system doesn't bankrupt our country. can you tell me whether we are dealing with $1 trillion waste prob? is it $1 trillion problem that has to do with trying to give the best care in the last month of people's lives? where is the so-called fact that everyone in washington's convinced exists?

>> well, first of all, you've got two things. you've got based on the central command definition of what health care is today, right? so you've got things that are done twice basically on average claims are handled twice, procedures, tests and things like that are done twice as often as they're needed. so if you look at it that way, you could take easily 25%, 30% out of the cost of care today. you've got hospitals that don't typically do a given procedure, but they're eager to do it, so they do it badly because they don't have enough practice. so you've got about 43% more hospital beds than you need. it's a massive problem. just based on our current definition of health care. but the bigger problem is there's no market. so half of us think there's too much health care in health care. half of us think there's not enough. there's no connection to the personal desires of individual consumers in the health care market the way there are in consumer electronics or

transportation or financial services. and that's the next thing we can fix at athena by building more of a market, making it possible for your health information to go where it needs to go without wondering if it'll be lost. >> well, if you're as eloquent trying to solve the national problems as you are creating amazing value for shareholders, it's an honor to have you on, this is one of the fastest growing best companies in the country. thank you very much to jonathan bush. >> thank you, jim. i feel like i had a guitar lesson with elvis. >> okay. thank you. >> look, a stock is expensive and goes up, why? because it's the best. this is quite simply the best of the best of the breed. it is expensive. i put that out there. this company was the pioneer. jonathan bush did, you can say he invented the darn thing. jonathan bush, president and ceo of athenahealth. keep up with cramer all day

long, follow @jimcramer on twitter and tweet your questions #madtweets. i don't spend money on gasoline. i am probably going to the gas station about once a month. last time i was at a gas station was about...i would say... two months ago. i very rarely put gas in my chevy volt. i go to the gas station such a small amount that i forget how to put gas in my car. [ male announcer ] and it's not just these owners giving the volt high praise. volt received the j.d. power and associates appeal award two years in a row. ♪

with multiple lacerations to the wing and a fractured beak. surgery was successful, but he will be in a cast until it is fully healed, possibly several months. so, if the duck isn't able to work, how will he pay for his living expenses? aflac. like his rent and car payments? aflac. what about gas and groceries? aflac. cell phone? aflac, but i doubt he'll be using his phone for quite a while cause like i said, he has a fractured beak. [ male announcer ] send the aflac duck a get-well card at getwellduck.com.

you aren't supposed to make this kind of big money buying low-dollar stocks. last year you made a killing in the single digits, what a series of highly visible below $5 stocks and i regard these as a verification of my theory something whacky that everyone should have something speculative in his or her

portfolio. it can keep you in the game by making the process intriguing and you can make huge profits. check out these gains. let's say you bought sprint in may of last year at $2.30. you have now much more than doubled your money. if you purchased clearwire at 91 cents as recently as july 26th of 2012, you caught a triple after sprint bid for the company. those who had the guts to buy supervalu, i didn't at $1.80 back in october of 2012 are verging on a double after the announcement made this morning. and finally if you'd taken a chance with nokia back in july at $1.69, you would have doubled your capital after the cell phone company announced sharply better than expected earnings today. frankly, even i, a huge supporter of speculation am astounded at these gains. how could you not be? in every case, these companies were supposed to be on if ropes. turns out they all had more value than we realized. although the value was obscured

typically by weak balance sheets. sprint clearwire and supervalu have been burdened with huge amounts of debts. soft bank took a look at sprint after it successfully reenergized the business and liked it enough to buy a controlling stake in the company. clearwire as tattered as its balance sheet was turned out to have extremely valuable spectrum. so valuable that even though sprint decided to buy the rest of its money with money soft bank gave them, a maverick businessman brilliant chairman of dish networks has been drawn into the bidding of the company in order, perhaps, to get some of that spectrum in short supply and so needed for cell phone service. it is one of the largest super markets in the country. some of the best brand names in the business. albertsons, lucky, across the street from my daughter. these are all terrific places to shop and often loved in the communities. the problem was the balance sheet and with rates low, a private equity outfit can

leverage its balance sheet to fix the real problem, too much debt, they take it on, loan refinance. nokia, turns out the big expense cuts coupled with hot, cheap smartphones weren't enough to get the company to report better than expected numbers. you could have two different take aways. one is to say, hey, that's terrific, jim, you lost a fortune before you were able to get a fraction of your money back. i bridled that because, fortunately, those who watch the show over and over again know i disliked all of these on the way down. you could correctly argue i stayed too negative not liking supervalu and clearwire. this isn't an easy speculation game. i did manage to nail sprint and i'd say, well, i said it was too late to sell nokia. i know some of you are probably thinking right now you should be buyer other down and outers like best buy and hewlett-packard. is best buy too low? i think you could still fall. and hewlett-packard, i'd rather be a buyer than a seller at this point. new position. the moral of the story, speculate, it can work. and from sprint, clearwire, i

can tell you it works much better than i could have imagined. ♪ ♪ ♪ [ male announcer ] don't just reject convention. drown it out. introducing the all-new 2013 lexus ls f sport. an entirely new pursuit.